Chris Christie Doubles Down on Koch Fueled Cluelessness About The Minimum Wage

Chris Wallace, hosting Fox News Sunday, tried to toss Republican Governor Chris Christie (NJ) a lifeline on Sunday, asking him to clarify his comments that he was “tired of hearing about the minimum wage”. But Christie wasn’t having any of that; he knows how to hang himself with Fox rope.

Ignoring his plunging approval ratings in his state and the fact that just days ago he was claiming that he had been misunderstood, Christie announced that he knows what the country needs, and it’s not a discussion about the minimum wage. “What we need to do in this country is not have debate over a higher minimum wage. We have to have a debate over creating better-paying middle class jobs in this country.”

Oh. And here logic thought that raising the minimum wage would equal a better paying job. Apparently not in GOP world.

Watch here:

http://youtu.be/olqrbQ7asRs

Wallace tried to help Christie dress up his tax cuts to big business and cuts to pensions in “concern”, explaining to the Republican governor that people earning the minimum wage feel a few bucks would be a big deal for them, “For people making $7.25 an hour — the minimum wage now, they say that getting an increase to $10 an hour would make a big difference in their lives, and you were being cavalier about it.”

But Christie, who knows nothing about living on the minimum wage due in part to his big government salary funded ironically by the people whose pensions he cut, wasn’t buying what the people report about their own experiences of trying to make $7.25 an hour work.

He dismissed their concerns with his trademarked Christie sneer, “I’m saying it exactly as I see it. What we need to do in this country is not have debate over a higher minimum wage. We have to have a debate over creating better-paying middle class jobs in this country.”

It’s odd for a Republican to claim that we need “debate” about job creation, especially as a member of the party that in Congress refuses to pass any job creations bills just because Obama wants them. Adding salt to their “trickle down” wounds is the fact that under President Obama, private sector job growth continues to shatter the record set by the last President to set records for private sector job growth. That president was also a Democrat — Bill Clinton.

Christie doesn’t exactly have a banging record on job creation in his state. Josh Israel at Think Progress pointed out:

… New Jersey’s 2009 unemployment rate of 9.7 percent mirrored the national average — but the current 6.5 percent rate is 0.6 percent higher than the 5.9 percent rate unemployment nationally. Over that time, as Wallace noted, the state has had its credit rating downgraded more times than under any other governor in New Jersey history, and to the second lowest level in the nation.

Christie then tried to dismiss people making the minimum wage as the “political elite”, “If that somehow doesn’t comport with what people in the political elite want, well, I’m sorry.”

It’s unclear why Republicans feel they need more debate on how to create jobs, since they promised everyone that their tax cuts to millionaires and big business would trickle down. Years later, as that has not happened, and indeed many states with Republican governors are doing worse than the national average, it’s high time to ask them why they expect the people to keep letting Republicans bang their head into the same brick wall and expecting different results.

There was no “debate” over Republicans’ tax cuts for the top 2%. Yet they feel we need more debate about decent paying jobs. In which the word “debate” means duck and dodge for the Koch Brothers’ agenda. It is inevitable that Republicans who carry Koch water will end up making fools of themselves as they try to justify policies that don’t make any sense and fly in the face of facts.

And this is how Chris Christie managed to take a Fox lifeline and toss it overboard with his surly immunity to facts and obtuse sense of being invincible.

Ms. Jones is the Editor-in-Chief of PoliticusUSA and a Huffington Post contributor. She has covered President Barack Obama, 2016 Democratic candidate for president Hillary Clinton, VP Joe Biden, Senator Elizabeth Warren, First Lady Michelle Obama, former President Bill Clinton, and Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Sarah hosts Politicus News and co-hosts Politicus Radio. Her analysis has been featured on several national radio, television news programs and talk shows, and print outlets including regular appearances on The Ann Walker Show With Scott Nevins for UBN Radio and KPTR 1450’s California Woman 411, The Washington Post, The Atlantic Wire, CNN, MSNBC, The Week, The Hollywood Reporter, The Richard Dawkins Foundation and more.

Sarah has won two Telly Awards and is a member of the Society of Professional Journalists. She graduated Magna Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa with a degree in Latin and Psychology, including studying the psychology of organized crime, with graduate studies in the psychology of linguistics and Latin poetry.

They don’t give a d**n about their base, do they? Are the GOP deliberately helping the Democrats keep control of the Senate? The statements that have been made over the past fortnight indicates they are.
Saying you are proud that you caused Americans to loose their jobs, are tired of discussing the minimum wage, saying you are ok with suppressing votes….is not a winning strategy. There are Independent voters and the undecided out there who are listening to this.
Christie doesn’t care that his ratings are down. He got what he wanted, a second term to continue N. J. financial meltdown. This is what the Koch Bros want and the voters of NJ have shown they are dumber than voters in KS. Brownback is being ousted, unlike Christie. This is what NJ asked for, this is what they got.

Well…the chickens are coming home to roost…Walmart, and a few other corps, are bemoaning how their sales are down, and have finally realized they strangled their golden goose….minimum wage workers can no longer afford to buy their crapola. I see a wage hike coming soon to a Walmart near you.

Why be concerned about minimum wages when combined incomes exceed $799,000.00 between his salary and his wife’s??????????? The Koch philosophy is the ruination of the middle class.GOP mantra is>>>>>>>>>GET OUR PROFITS……the 99% be damned.

Come on folks. If I have four oranges and give four to steve, how many does john get? I assume we all went to kindergarten. Cost of living is the problem here. Make believe pay increases are not the solution. (I’m going to give you and everyone else four million dollars, worked great in Zimbabwe I’m sure.)